


Finding Unicorns

by kanoitrace



Series: Finding Unicorns [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Castiel & Meg Masters Friendship, Cheating Castiel, Dysfunctional Family, Eating Disorders, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Family Feels, Gen, Happy Ending, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Male-Female Friendship, Meg Masters & Dean Winchester friendship, Meg centric, Minor Castiel/Meg Masters, Mostly off-screen Dean Winchester/Castiel, Past Child Abuse, Ruby & Meg Masters as sisters, Sam Winchester & Meg Masters friendship, Substance Abuse, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-01
Updated: 2014-09-28
Packaged: 2018-02-15 15:34:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2234262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kanoitrace/pseuds/kanoitrace
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You fell in love with a unicorn. It was beautiful, then sad, then sadder. I laughed, I cried, I puked in my mouth a little. And honestly, I kind of get it." Meg Masters has had a rough life, between a physically abusive mother, a father who wanted nothing to do with her, and a strained relationship with her sister, so she turns to the vices of drugs and alcohol to dim the pain, and to not eating to offer herself some semblance of control. When she meets Castiel Novak in her literature class, the two become quick friends and then something more. However, it takes losing that relationship for her to realize that maybe she is worth something and that there may be more people that care about her than she initially though. She realizes that maybe it is worth getting her life together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Castiel

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural. I have nothing witty to add in this space today.

"You're beautiful."

She looks at him, eyebrow raised curiously. He's staring up at her, smiling brightly, blue eyes shiny and wide.

"Yeah, I'm sure," she laughs out sardonically, smirking.

He scrambles to sit up and look her in the face, smile still wide and so pure it hurts to look at. "I mean it, you are." And he sounds so damn happy about it that she can't squash the reflex to roll her eyes.

"Whatever." She takes a long, lazy drag of her cigarette, paper burning away to ash, and she almost chokes on the burn, the smoke getting the best of her for once.

"That's so bad for you." She glances at him out of the corner of her eye, and he's looking at her so earnestly that it sends bugs to skittering under her skin and her fingers to twitching.

She wants to respond  _As are most things I do to myself_ , but instead says, "Tell me something I don't know," smirking languidly at him. His smiles softens, blue eyes looking oh so sad, and so she returns her attention to the window.

* * *

 

The party is loud and raucous, and she's not sure how many different kinds of drugs she's taken, never mind how many drinks she's had. It might be enough to kill her if she's not careful, and she never is. But that's completely fine by her because it numbs the pain, and she's never much cared if she died anyway. The Russian roulette might be half the fun by this point. And then her eyes meet blue, and she smiles, about as happy a smile as she's ever managed, and she saunters over to him, trying to remember that her feet have to stay on the ground and she can't really fly like the cocktail in her system tries to make her think she can.

Her eyes never leave his as she makes her way through the sea of bodies, trying hard not to spill her drink. He meets her half way, smiling at her like she hung the damn moon.

"Great party, huh?" she drawls, and he chuckles at the sarcasm that drizzles from it. "Dance with me?" she asks, and it's soft enough that she'd feel uncomfortably vulnerable if the drugs hadn't reasonably dulled all unpleasant sensation.

His smile softens. "Of course, my lady." He takes her free hand, spinning her around. Her drink sloshes sloppily over the edge of her cup, but she hardly minds.

They dance for what feels like hours, though it surely is no where near, the space between them closing more with each new beat of music until finally they're on top of each other and his lips meet hers or hers meet his, she doesn't really know what came first. When they start pawing at each other in an inebriated haze, she pulls away with a mean little nip to his bottom lip. "Let's find somewhere a little more private, yeah?"

He nods mutely, clearly dazed between the lust and the alcohol, and as she leads him to some random bedroom, the fleeting thought that she should feel guilty for being such a bad influence passes through her mind, but guilt was a feeling lost somewhere between the last pill she popped and the drink she lost somewhere between dancing and kissing. Which is fine. It'd just get in the way of fucking, anyway.

* * *

When she wakes up the next morning, it's to a hangover the size of Texas and wide, bloodshot, blue eyes watching her dazedly. He smiles at her, for all the world looking like he's just found the greatest treasure mankind has ever seen instead of the biggest headache she's sure he's ever had. She smiles back, a soft, genuine one she didn't even know she was capable of when sober. Maybe she's still fucked up.

* * *

They never really talk about it, never admit it was some kind of mistake. Instead, they fall into a sort of relationship. She lets it happen because it should be fun for awhile, even if she knows it won't last. She has no misconceptions about his intentions in this- he wants to fix her, she can see it in his eyes. Only, she doesn't wanted to be fixed. She probably can't be fixed. But for as aware of his intentions as she is, she's not sure he understands them fully himself. He doesn't seem to realize that this is all about what he can do for her instead of what she can do for him, and she should probably appreciate that fact. But even if she doesn't, she can appreciate how besotted he is with her, and she can appreciate how nice it feels for a little while. Because she's always been more than a little smitten with him herself, ever since they sat next to each other in their freshman lit class and debated on Milton's  _Paradise Lost_.

It honestly lasts longer than she ever expects, and it's nice to feel cared for even if she's just a project.

 


	2. Dean

They have three months of bliss before  _he_  comes along. They have three more months after that before they break.

The rabbit hole forms with the arrival of Ruby's new boy-toy Sam Winchester. Meg's seen him around, but as she tends to avoid Rudy, she doesn't know much about him other than he's a tall and awkward thing. And also really good in the sack, if Ruby's passing comments are to be believed. Honestly, she feels a little bad for the boy. The Masters girls are renownedly toxic, bad influences. Though she'd honestly never felt remorseful about it before she and Castiel started... whatever it is they're doing. But he's so damn wholesome, and he treats her like she's worth something, and it all actually makes her want to clean up her act, to be kind of good, which, admittedly,sucks. But wanting to clean up her act and actually doing it are two very different things, and she can't become some kind of reformed bad girl all at once. But she cuts back on the drugs and the alcohol, which is a start, even if it makes her actually feel something. And feeling makes her want to run back to them all over again. But, she perseveres because this is good, and it's something that she doesn't want to screw up for once.

About a month into dating Sam, Ruby insists that Meg and Castiel join them on a double date. She tells him only so that she can say she did, and she hopes that he hates the idea as much as she does. Unfortunately, he actually likes the idea, so on Friday night she's dragged along to some higher end restaurant against her will. Castiel and Sam actually really hit it off, so she's left to watching her sister hang all over her boy-toy, who is excitedly talking about books with her own boyfriend while she eats food that tastes rotten on her tongue and sits heavy in her stomach. They go to a movie after, some kind of artsy, foreign film that Ruby obviously agreed to in an attempt to impress Sam. And though normally she'd have a vague interest in these sorts of things, though she'd never admit it, dinner has made her so sick that she can't even pay attention to the voices, never mind the subtitles.

After that night, Castiel and Sam start hanging out regularly, which leaves her time to do her own thing. Though, now-a-days, her own thing pretty much consists of sitting in her room smoking packs of cigarettes. She starts to become acutely aware of the fact that she doesn't actually have many friends, any, in fact. It had never bothered her much before. She'd had Cas, who was probably the closest thing she's ever had to a best friend, and then Alistair, but drug dealers with violent streaks don't exactly count as buddy material. Mostly, her time had been filled with parties and random hook-ups and finding new and exciting ways to get high. The most adventurous she ever got now was trying a new brand of smokes. She can't remember the last time she'd ever felt this lonely. It was probably when she was a little girl with a mommy who hit her and a daddy who wanted nothing to do with her, back in the days before she'd ever discovered what vices were. She decides enough is enough when the knife set in the kitchen starts looking overly appealing. She asks Castiel if she can start hanging out with him and Sam. The smile she receives in return is blinding, and he tells her he thought she'd never ask.

Sam lives about twenty minutes from campus, back towards the town proper, with his older brother Dean. Meg has heard the name before. She knows Ruby hates him, Sam has some sort of unhealthy idolization of him, and Castiel seems to want to be his best friend. She's never met him herself though, so she holds out on making her own opinions. Dean isn't home the first two times they all hang out, and the third time they all meet at a bowling alley downtown. Meg abhors bowling, but there's beer, and she can get away without eating any of the greasy food with an excuse of it won't agree with her stomach. Which it won't, but she doesn't have to explain herself when the food is unhealthy. There's also the added bonus of getting to watch Ruby throw gutter balls all night, which is enough to put anyone in a good mood. The next time they all meet at Sam's, though, Dean is home. Overall, Meg doesn't find herself overly impressed with him. If you like the overly macho, wrought-with-daddy issues types, she supposes he's okay. And he's easy to rile, which she most certainly  **does**  like. Overall, he's not too bad, could be worse. She figures she has more in common with him than with Sam. What she decidedly should not like is that Castiel's eyes follow him like a love-struck puppy's. She shouldn't like it, but she finds it hard to actually get worked up about. She knew it would end anyway.

But Castiel doesn't call it all off. She figures it's because, yet again, he's completely oblivious to what he really wants. The guy is brilliant, but really useless when it comes to dealing with feelings, especially his own. But she never says anything to him about it. If he can't figure it out, she certainly isn't going to point it out. She may be starting to reform, but she's still a selfish bitch. And even when Cas and Dean start hanging out more, he's loyal to a fault, texting her all throughout the evening until one of them heads to bed. He's over-compensating, and he doesn't even realize it, but she gladly soaks up the attention. To keep her own mind occupied, she starts reading more, and occasionally hangs out with Sam when neither of them have class. He's a total nerd, but she can actually do nerd. Reputation aside, she likes nerdy things, herself. Plus, there's the bonus that it drives Ruby ballistic. But there isn't a whole lot her little sister can do about it when she's in her own classes and wants her boyfriend to think she's not the jealous type. Which, in all fairness, Meg supposes she probably isn't, she just knows better than to trust her own sister, one way or another.

And for a while, it all seems to be working out great. She's even cut back on the smoking and started eating when there aren't people watching, not a lot, but it's light-years from where she was. But in one night, she knows it's over, even before Cas comes stumbling into her apartment, clothes mussed and tears in his eyes. She's alone that night, having a quite night in, reading Milton again. It's quiet and almost relaxing until she realizes her clock is flashing "12:00 AM" at her and she hasn't heard a single word from Castiel all night. He was spending the evening with Dean. They were going out to some bar for a guy's night. As she sets her book down and curls into her blankets, begging for sleep to overtake the anxiety churning in her gut, she briefly thinks that maybe she's over-reacting. She clings to that thought more readily than she imagined she would. She sleeps terribly, the worst she has in years, in fact.

She gets up early, before the sun even fully rises, and not knowing what to do with herself, her mind running too fast to read and her stomach too sick with nerves to bother with food in any way, she cleans. She checks the clock around eight-thirty, and what can't be more than fifteen minutes later, there's a knock at her door. She's fully prepared for it to be the bitchy lady from down stairs, complaining about her running the vacuum at the asscrack of dawn, and she even kind of finds herself hoping it is. She could do with a fight right about now. Instead, she opens the door to find Castiel, clothes rumples, bags under his eyes, and she can even see a couple of hickies peeking out from below his collar.

"Can I come in?" he croaks, sounding as though he's keeping it all together with sewing thread and scotch tape.

"Sure." She tries to smile at him like she has no idea, but it's shaky at best. When he walks by her she can see one giant bruising mark on his neck, and she's wants to throw up. She closes the door and turns to face him, trying for all the world to wear a smirk and saucy attitude like this doesn't faze her. "So what can I do for you, Clarence?"

To his credit, he looks as broken as she feels, if not more so. "Meg, I... I'm so sorry." He croaks it out, looking like he might start crying at any moment. Which she wants to think is hardly fair.  **She** should be the one crying. "Dean... Dean and I... I don't even know how to say this."

"Danced the horizontal tango?" she offers, surprising even herself in just how calm she sounds, how calm she actually is starting to feel. Castiel looks up at her in abject fear.

"H-how... How did you..."

She shrugs. "Saw it coming a mile away, actually. You always were the last to know what you wanted." She offers him a sad little smile.

He swallows thickly, looking her in the eyes. Some part of her brain takes note that a couple of tears have spilled over his lashes. It makes his eyes so very blue, and she wonders if she could drown in those eyes and die. It's a jarring thought. She's never actually thought that she wants to die before, just never much cared if she did. She's aware of her eyes stinging with tears of her own, but she can't look away.

"Meg... God, I... I'm sorry. Please don't think... It's not that I didn't... I really did..." He can't seem to get the words out properly, staring at her helplessly as he is.

She offers him smile of her own, such a terribly broken one that she's not sure he can even tell it's a smile. "I know you did."

And then he hugs her, or she hugs him, once again she finds she has no clue who starts what between them. And they're both falling to the floor, crying over spilt milk and what they broke. And it's strangely cathartic.


	3. Ruby

She goes on a week-long bender, skipping all of her classes and reveling in all the bad habits she'd kicked while with him. She wants to burn away the memories of their time together until there's nothing left but a blue, blue haze. But she doesn't hate him. Never could.

She all but abandons her phone in that week, except for the one time she used it to call Alistair. Otherwise, it sits in some lost corner of her apartment. She's aware of it going off many times throughout the first several days, but she ignores it. She has better things to do with her time than talk to concerned friends. Things like the drug dealer she has laying in her bed that will fuck her until all the jangling, broken pieces of her self fit together like some ill-made puzzle. Or until he kills her, which, considering his preferences in the bedroom, is a very likely possibility. Either way, it doesn't feel like it matters. She blows through booze and pills at a rate quick enough to threaten overdose, while all the food she'd accumulated passes the expiration dates. It's over-indulgence to make up for half a year of good behavior, and the plan is to not remember any of it. Hell, if she can forget her own name through it all, that's fine, too.

And then the week is over. She has a hangover that could kill a horse and bruises that should worry her, but it's over. She makes herself coffee while she takes enough aspirin to give her cirrhosis of the liver, though it would be shocking if she didn't already have it. Then she curls up in the window with her coffee, a pack of smokes, and her cellphone. It's dead, of course. She contemplates getting the charger, but everything hurts too much to move, and she isn't sure she's ready to face the music quite yet. So, she tosses it onto the couch several feet away and lights a cigarette. She stares out the window watching the sun make its way across the sky. She doesn't move all day, and even when the sun fades below the horizon, she still sits there. When the moon is hanging bright and heavy in the sky, the lock on her front door clicks. She glances over, watching as Ruby rushes in uninvited. She must look like shit because she can hear Ruby's intake of breath and see the shock on her face.

"That bad, huh?" she drawls.

Ruby's face twists into an expression that encapsulates that tricky intersection of relief, anger, and upset. It isn't very flattering.

"What the hell, Meg!" Ruby's storming across the room, looking like she's trying to decide if she's going to hug her or strangle her.

 _Too late on that one_ , she thinks wryly, all too aware of the ring of black bruises around her neck.

"The fuck happened to you!?" Ruby looks like she might cry, eying Meg's neck, but that's obviously not all she's referring to.

Meg just stares back blandly.

"You can't answer a fucking phone!?"

"It was dead," she states, like it's the most reasonable excuse in the world.

"I fucking know it's dead! Shit's been going straight to voice mail for days, which, by the way, has been full since fucking Wednesday!"

"Well why'd you go and do a thing like that?' She feels the smirk curling onto her face, and it's more out of gross habit than any actual feeling connected to it.

"You can't just do that shit! You stopped going to class, you didn't answer your phone, you fell off the face of the fucking planet, Meg! We thought...! We thought..." The anger seems to drain out of Ruby, tears filling her eyes and threatening to spill over. Ruby looks at her helplessly, and blinks once. The tears do spill over then. "We thought you were dead." And then Ruby throws herself at Meg in a hug, and Meg grunts because it hurts like shit when her body is as abused as it is. And she wants to make some smart remark, something like  _It took you a week to check?_  but she doesn't have the energy. Instead, she ends up hugging Ruby back, curling into her like a wounded kitten. And at first, the tears don't come, only dry, broken sobs. But once she does start crying, she finds she can't stop. It's all-consuming and bordering on hysteria. And it isn't Cas she's crying over, not really, not anymore. But Ruby just rubs soothing circles into her back and pets her hair, whispering soft reassurances into her ear.

It feels like hours later when she finally regains herself, and it very well may be. Her head is stuffy in that awful way only crying causes, her eyes are puffy to the point of pain, and she can't breathe through all the snot accumulated in her nose. She must look and sound a mess, but Ruby just kisses her on the crown of her head. Her sister heads into her bedroom and returns with a box of tissues. She flips the light switch on her way back, and Meg groans miserably as yellow light floods the room.

"Yeah, yeah. Quit complaining. It's better than sitting in the dark."

"I like the dark," Meg mumbles like a petulant child.

"Do you want the tissues or not?"

She shoots Ruby a sad mockery of a glare, but her sister just raises an eyebrow expectantly. Eventually, Meg concedes with a pouted out bottom lip and grabby hands up at her. Ruby rolls her eyes but hands them over anyway. She goes through about three tissues before she feels like she can even kind of breathe again.

"So are you going to sit there all night?" Ruby's referring to her spot on the floor. She's not actually sure when they got to the floor, but now that she's here, she's not so sure her body can move.

"Legs don't work," she grumbles, staring moodily at the crumpled up tissue in her hands.

She can practically hear Ruby's eyes rolling. "Don't be so dramatic."

She figures she'll try it a different way. "Don't feel like moving."

"What, are you just going to sleep in the floor?" Ruby asks impatiently, and Meg can see from her shadow that she's put her hands on her hips.

"Why not?"

"Oh, for gods sakes!" Then Ruby is hauling her off the floor, almost completely flinging Meg off balance with the abruptness and strength behind the motion.

Once they're both righted, Ruby fixes her with a critical look, but Meg can see the concern too. "You need to gain some weight."

"Gained three pounds," she mutters miserably back.

"Oooo! Three pounds!" Ruby mocks back. "And that was what? Before your little, week-long stunt you just pulled?" When Meg refuses to respond or look at her, she sags with a sigh of "Let's get you to bed." Ruby's hand goes to the small of her back, the other on her arm as she helps her walk to her room. She really is feeling unsteady on her feet. About half-way there, Ruby tells her, "We're gonna get you a huge breakfast in the morning."

"Won't be able to eat it," she argues, but it's weak.

"Well, you're gonna try." Ruby's tone leaves no question that the discussion is over.

Ruby tucks her into her bed, but instead of turning around and leaving like Meg expects her to, she goes to the closet and flips on the light, digging through clothes.

Meg furrows her brow. "What are you doing?"

"Finding something to sleep in." She straightens and turns back to face Meg, wearing an incredulous expression. "You didn't seriously think I was about to leave you alone, did you?"

Instead of answering  _Yes, that's exactly what I thought you were going to do, because when have we ever acted like sisters that care about each other?_ , she just says, "My clothes won't fit your fat ass." There's no real venom behind the comment; it's just a sarcastic deflection. Ruby snorts out a scoffing laugh.

"Yeah, thanks for that." Then she's back to trying to find something to wear.

Eventually, Ruby settles on a ratty, old band tee that she finds in the back of the closet. It's huge on Meg, but it will fit Ruby a little better considering her abundance of curves compared to Meg's more stick-like figure. She watches at Ruby pulls out her phone from her pocket, sends a text, and then turns it off before setting it on the bedside table. She raises an eyebrow once Ruby looks back in her direction.

"Letting Sam know you're alive."

"You aren't going to wait for his response? You've been here a long time. He's probably worried."

Ruby shrugs. "Nah. He gets the emotionally distraught, needy sibling thing."

"Gee, thanks."

Ruby just flashes her a grin before stripping down to her underwear and pulling the shirt over her head. The thing barely covers her ass. Then she crawls into the bed behind Meg and actually fucking starts spooning with her.

It sends an indistinct pain through Meg's heart, some kind of mournful tugging. "Can we not do the cuddling thing?"

"No, sorry. We're doing the cuddling thing."

Meg sighs in defeat, knowing that she's not winning any fights of will against her sister any time soon. She's asleep minutes later.

Knowing she isn't going to win against her sister certainly doesn't stop her from trying, especially when she's woken up by sunlight filling her whole room and blinding her because Rudy fully opens the blinds. She groans loudly in irritation before rolling over, her back facing the light.

"Get up. We're going to breakfast."

"Not moving," Meg insists.

"Well, I was going to make you breakfast in bed, but your dumb ass doesn't own any food."

She highly doubts Ruby would have actually served her breakfast in bed. "I do too," she argues.

"Rice and out-of-date milk do  **not**  count as having food."

Meg considers pointing out she also has frozen broccoli, but as that probably won't help her case, she just groans miserably again, burying her head under the blankets.

"No, no. Ass up!" And she doesn't really have a choice when her bitch of a sister rips the blankets off the bed, taking Meg with them.

They wind up at an IHOP about two blocks down from where Meg lives, and when she tries to order scrambled egg-whites and a side of fruit, Ruby quickly vetoes it and tells the waitress to bring her a pancake combo. Which is how she ends up staring down an ungodly amount of food while her sister stares her down.

Meg glances up at Ruby through her lashes, feeling annoyed. "What can I do to make you stop staring me down like the nun in a whorehouse?" She can tell Ruby is trying to not smile at the comment.

"Eat a bite of pancake."

"I'll eat a bite of the eggs."

"No. Pancake."

They stare each other down for a moment more, probably looking like the biggest pair of morons in the place, before Meg finally huffs out an annoyed sound. "Jesus Christ! Fine!" She jabs her fork violently into the fluffy monstrosities, much more forcefully than necessary, before jamming a huge piece in her mouth.

Ruby's watching her, a shit-eating grin spreading across her face. "No syrup?" Meg just glares. Her sister is far too easily amused with herself.

Breakfast was a fiasco, but Ruby did manage to get her to take a least one bite of everything on her plate. She actually took two bites of the eggs. The rest Ruby packed up in a to-go box. Meg tried to tell her she wouldn't eat, but Ruby just told her, "Yes, you will."

When they get home, Meg flops down onto the couch while Rudy goes to place their leftovers in the fridge. Then Ruby is sitting next to her, facing her and watching her expectantly.

Meg does her best to ignore it, but after a while it really starts to grate her nerves.

"What?" she snaps, turning to face Ruby in exasperation.

Ruby doesn't flinch, just keeps watching her. "We gonna talk about it?"

"Talk about what?"

"Oh gee, I don't know. How about the fact that your boyfriend cheated on you with his best friend and then you fell off the face of the planet for a whole week. How about the fact you have a fucking bruise that is obviously an imprint of someone's hands around your neck. How about we talk about the fact that you're trying to kill yourself with drugs and not eating."

Ruby is livid and hurt, she can tell, but the only response she can give is to lamely say, "I'm not trying to kill myself."

Ruby's face softens, looking more pitying than anything. "Meg, it's not healthy."

Meg scoffs and looks away from her sister. "I haven't been healthy for a long time. Why do you suddenly care now?"

Ruby stands abruptly. "The fuck is that supposed to me!"

Meg stands too, suddenly feeling more rage than she's felt in a long time. "It means since when do we act like sisters! Ones that actually fucking care about each other! What!? You learn that from the Winchesters!? Because they're such a fucking good example! Dean is a fucking head case who goes around fucking other people's boyfriends and Sammy's fucked in the head enough t-" And then Ruby slaps her. Hard. Meg wouldn't be surprised if she'd knocked a few teeth loose.

"Don't even think about saying that! Don't you dare! Yeah, you're right! We never acted like sisters! We came from a fucked up home with a fucked up family that did fucked up things to us! And maybe I did get a little jealous of Sam's relationship with Dean because I don't have that with my sister! But don't you  **dare** insult him, because at least they try! And now I'm trying! And you won't even bother! Why won't you even fucking talk to me!" And Ruby is crying by the end of it. And as quickly as her anger had come, it fades, leaving behind a bone-aching exhaustion, so she slumps back down on the couch, puts her face in her hands, and sighs tiredly. She can hear Ruby making small, hiccupping sounds above her.

Finally, she mumbles, "I don't know what you want me to say."

"Just... Just talk to me." Ruby's voice cracks.

"About what? You already said it all. My boyfriend left me for his best friend and I went on a bender."

Ruby sits beside her and places a hand on her knee. "But  **why**? I thought you'd been doing so much better. Cas seemed to think so, anyway."

She was feeling so frustrated by it all, and all she really wanted to do was bash her head in against a wall. Instead, she threw her head back against the couch and stared up at the ceiling. She blandly noted it looked like there might be some water damage.  _I'll have to call maintenance about that._

"Meg..."

She sighed, somewhere between tired and frustrated, and she just wanted this conversation to end. "I don't know, okay? I knew it wouldn't last, especially after seeing him and Dean together. So I don't know why I did it. Why I did any of it from the start. I guess I liked that he made me feel special. Either way, I just wanted to forget."

Ruby is suddenly hugging her, face buried in her hair. "He's worried about you, you know." She says it quietly, like it's a secret she's worried will set Meg off. But honestly, Meg would be more surprised if he wasn't worried. Cas was just too good a person to not be worried. Hell, he'd probably spent the whole week sick with the feeling, thinking he'd killed her or some dumb shit like that.

Instead of voicing those thoughts, she voices the one that had kept playing on repeat in her head throughout the whole relationship. "He only wanted to fix me."

Ruby pulls away, and Meg can feel the scrutiny of her gaze. "I don't think that's true..."

She shrugs, or makes an approximation of one anyway, the movement proving difficult with Ruby's arms still locked around her. Silence hangs heavy until Meg thinks maybe, just maybe, Ruby has decided to drop it, stop trying to make her talk about things she'd rather not talk about. Of course, then Ruby has to go and break the silence. "I used to think the same thing about Sam, you know."

She pauses, but Meg doesn't respond, so she continues. "When he and I first started dating, I thought, 'What the hell could a guy like him want with someone like me?' I thought maybe he'd just heard about my reputation and wanted sex, but then he didn't push for it on the first date. And he wanted a second, and then a third. I started wondering what was wrong with him. Was I a project for him? Some kind of pity case? But... I don't know. Sometimes it's still hard to believe that he actually cares about me."

"Just wait until he fucks his best friend." Ruby promptly pinches her arm. "Shit! What the hell!"

Ruby is staring at her in displeasure. "Look, Castiel seriously did wrong by you, so I'm all on board with hating him with you. But the point I'm trying to make is that not everyone has an agenda."

"...I don't hate him."

Ruby kisses her head. "I know."

"I think I hate myself."

Ruby hugs her tighter, once again burying her face in her hair. "I know."

"How do I stop that?"

"I don't know."

"Some help you are."

She can feel Ruby smile against her head. "Hey, look, I said I'd hate Castiel with you, never said I was a miracle worker."


	4. Meg

If there is one way Meg could sum up the following months, it is simply that "recovery sucks." She stays locked up in her apartment for another week after the bender, not yet ready to face the world. Ruby stays with her in that time, not even leaving to get her stuff. Instead, Sam brings it over for her. It isn't until almost the whole week has passed that it occurs to her that Ruby's continued presence means her sister has also not been attending classes. When she asks about it, Ruby assures her that she has emailed all her teachers to tell them she had a family emergency to attend to, and that they had all been very understanding. All the same, Meg can't help the guilt churning in her stomach over it, especially considering she hasn't been the most agreeable company. She doesn't mention it, though, knowing Ruby will simply tell her to stop being ridiculous, that there's nowhere else she would consider being. That weekend, Sam comes and stays with them, too, and it's actually almost pleasant. For the most part, they watch bad TV and play even worse board games. However, when Ruby excuses herself to shower, Meg learns the hidden agenda in Sam's arrival. He discusses therapy with her, even going as far as helping her find a good one. He says he's part of the deadbeat dad club, too, after all. And Meg can't help the chuckle and smirk that brings from her because, really, what a fucked up group they are, not a single one of them having parents that give a damn about them. Not ones that are alive, at least, in the instances of the Winchester brothers.

She would love to be pissed at Ruby and Sam for the sneak attack, but instead finds herself thankful. She knows they only want the best for her, and she had honestly begun thinking it was something worth considering. She just never knew if she could do it on her own. With Sam and Ruby at her back, though, it is much easier. Or so she thinks until she actually shows up to her appointment. She sits in the parking lot of the shrink's office for a good twenty minutes, contemplating turning tail and running. In the end, she doesn't; she tells herself it's because she's not the type to back down from a challenge, plus she doesn't want to deal with Sam and Ruby when they find out she didn't go. She pointedly avoids the part of her mind that tells her it's because she really wants the help, that maybe she deserves it.

She's fifteen minutes late by the time she enters the office, but the therapist just smiles welcomingly at her, shaking her hand and introducing herself as "Holly." The first session doesn't get much accomplished, at least in Meg's opinion. Mostly, she just tells the woman tidbits of what happened to interrupt the awkward silences. But still, at the end of the hour, Holly tells Meg she did good work and that she'll see her next week. When she gets home that evening, Ruby asks her how it went, but Sam is quick to tell Ruby that it's an inappropriate question and reassures Meg that she doesn't have to tell them if she doesn't want to, but that they're also here for her when and if she decides she does want to. In that moment, Meg thinks she's never liked Sam more, and she hopes he sticks around for a very long time.

Life eventually starts returning to normal, or at least some semblance of normal. It's drastically different all the same. Meg decides to drop her classes for the rest of the semester and pick them back up in the fall. After over two weeks of missed class, she's fallen behind anyway. Ruby suggests that she should talk to her teachers, clue them in on what happened and see what they say, but Meg declines, saying she wants to take the time to focus on getting her shit together anyway. The added stress of school and playing catch up probably won't agree too kindly with her already frayed psyche. When she tells Holly this, the therapist says she can understand that, and that Meg needs to be doing what she feels is best for her right now. She does suggest considering going back in the summer though, if she feels up to it by that point. Meg agrees to think on it. After all, falling too far behind isn't something she's overly fond of.

Ruby also moves back to her own apartment after the first month, and it's something Meg finds herself overwhelmingly grateful for. Having her sister around had been nice, but Meg is ultimately a loner by nature, so it's nice to have her space back again. And while she's grown to appreciate her sister more over the weeks they were together, Ruby is still her little sister, and little sisters can be exhausting. It isn't as though she's completely rid of her, anyway. Ruby texts her to the point that Meg would almost call it religious, and if she doesn't respond in a timely manner, she can expect her phone to blow up or a knock on her door. It can be irritating, but she also understands where her sister is coming from, and some small part of her may even appreciate it. And it's not like she see doesn't see Ruby, or Sam, every week anyway. The couple insist on hanging out with her at least once a week, if not more, whether they be doing it together or it's just one of them. And while she plays at exasperation with them, it's also nice to know they care.

The first couple of weeks of therapy go very much the same as the first session- uncomfortably relaying tidbits of the past half year that led her to the decision to seek help. But Holly is friendly and overwhelmingly positive, insisting each week that Meg is doing great, even when Meg, herself, feels she's done a shit load of nothing. If the circumstances and setting were different, Meg is certain she'd find Holly annoying, but, all things considered, she finds herself grateful this time around. It's the week after Ruby finally returns to her own apartment that Meg starts talking about the deep stuff, the stuff that led to her abuse of substances, as well as herself. The session starts like most others, awkwardly talking about what's happened in the week since they last met, which in large part revolves around Ruby's moving out and Meg's relief at solitude. This leads to a conversation about her relationship with her sister, or more, the lack-there-of one prior to a month ago. She tries to dance around it at first, not sure if she's ready to talk about a household where it was everyone out for themselves from as far back as she can remember. About halfway in, she decides the hell with it, this is what she's here for, after all. The floodgates break that day, and instead of finding it cathartic like every cornball movie and book would lead her to believe it should be, it's devastating. When she gets home that day she immediately curls up in bed and never bothers to turn the lights on. It turns into one of the days where Ruby ends up all but breaking her door down.

She almost doesn't go back the next week, still barely over the last session. She makes herself, though, and other than Holly acknowledging that the last session had been intense for Meg, she doesn't press further. It's a relaxing session, one that doesn't fully feel like therapy, not in the cliché sense of it, anyway. Still, afterwards, even Meg can tell that progress is slowly being made.

A couple more weeks pass, and before Meg is even aware of it, the semester is apparently over. Ruby says that everyone is getting together to celebrate surviving finals. They had all initially planned to go to a bar, but if Meg feels up to seeing everyone, which mean Castiel and Dean- both of which she hasn't seen since the breakup- they can change their plans and just hang around someone's house instead. Meg responds with a roll of her eyes and "I'm not an alcoholic, Ruby. I'm not going to 'fall off the wagon." Ruby narrows her eyes suspiciously, but relents, but not before reminding Meg that they can always leave if need be.

It's strange to be out in the world again, to be at a bar and surrounded by people. Honestly, Meg feels she probably isn't as okay as she insisted to Ruby that she would be. She's paranoid of someone that she had classes with asking what happened to her, or, even worse, catching sight of Alistair or one of his goons. And even though she's never felt she was a true alcoholic, not in the addiction sense, at least, she still has to be hyper-aware of her consumption. She's feeling stressed, and that's never been a good combination with drink. Still, it's nice to be out and actually doing something, and Ruby and Sam are good company. However, when the couple starts to get a little too nauseating for her palate, she excuses herself to get another beer.

She gets her drink in a fairly timely manner, considering how busy the place is, but she remains at the bar, trying to give Sam and Ruby some time to themselves. She figures they deserve it after putting up with her for the past few months.

She pays no mind to the people around her until a rough voice asks, "What are you doing just standing over here?"

She about jumps out of her skin, snapping her head around to find none other than Dean Winchester on her left side.

"Whoa, hey, didn't mean to scare you." He reaches a hand out as if to place it steadyingly on her shoulder, but he stops short, his hand staying suspended in awkward uncertainty.

She offers him a tight smile and a "No big deal," before taking a long pull of her beer. It's more therapeutic than it should be, and she figures that means she should probably slow down.

They stand shoulder-to-shoulder, or as close to it as their differences in height allow, in awkward silence. Meg glances over at the table her sister and Sam are sitting at and notices that Castiel has joined them now. Dean apparently notices her line of sight because he finally says, "He's been worried about you, you know. Has wanted to call you for months, but he just wasn't sure if it was appropriate."

Meg smiles fondly. "He always was bad with social etiquette."

Dean snorts out a chuckle. "Yeah, he sure is." When Meg glances at him out of the corner of her eye, she notes that he's wearing just about the sappiest smile she's ever seen on anyone, and it actually warms her heart a little. Cas deserves someone who loves him that much.

She casts her eyes back to the table, watching the three people sitting there laugh over something. "So you guys are doing okay?"

Dean starts coughing, and when she looks at him, it's obvious he's choking on his beer. She gives him a half-hearted pat on the back, and quirks a smirk at him when he finally turns wide eyes to her. "Um... Uh... I mean..."

She rolls her eyes. "Look, I know I come off as this uber-bitch, but I really do want the best for him, and if that happens to be you, I can accept that."

Dean smiles at her then, and it's tiny, barely a shadow of a smile, but it's heart-wrenchingly real. "Yeah, we're good."

She gives her own small smile back, and hopes it conveys all that good things she wants it to.

They once more fall into silence, but it's comfortable this time, warm and companionable, as they spend the time simply watching the people that mean the most to them. And she can't help but find herself thinking that maybe if only they had met sooner or in some other way, she and Dean could have forged a bond and forgone a lot of pain. Or maybe they simply would have crashed in glorious flames all the quicker. Maybe they were just the types of people who weren't meant to function without loved ones to hold them up and make them believe in themselves when the world- and shit parents- told them they couldn't.

"You did right by Sam, I can tell."

He chuckled warmly, and she could hear the material of his shirt shift as he shook his head. "Nah, he's just a smart kid."

They fell into silence again, just watching. Eventually, their presence must be missed because the others start turning their heads about as if looking for them, so they head to the table and take their seats- Dean between Sam and Castiel, Meg on Castiel's other side and flanked by Ruby. And it was suddenly easy to think that this was what life was supposed to be- friends, family, good food, and beer.

The night winds down around one in the morning, everyone happy and varying shades of intoxicated. Sam is, unsurprisingly, the drunkest of all, needing to unwind more than anyone after the added stress of needing to achieve perfect grades, what with aspirations for law school. Dean offers Ruby a ride home, since he's mostly sober and his younger brother had been her ride to begin with. He also extends the same to Meg, but she insists she'll just walk home instead. It is, after all, a nice night, and she's in the opposite direction of Chez Winchester. Castiel says he'll walk her home; after all, he lives not too far from her. So, with a chaste kiss to Dean's lips, he promises he'll call him later, and then they're all scattering to their destinations.

The air between them isn't what she would necessarily call uncomfortable, or even truly awkward, but it lacks the warmth and familiarity that had been present with everyone else at the bar. They walk a block and a half in the silence, and it's about all she can take.

As she opens her mouth to say something, anything, Castiel beats her to it. "I'm so sorry."

The words make her mouth dry and still her walking. Castiel walks a few more steps, head bowed, before he realizes she's stopped and turns to face her. His expression is guilty and open, eyes as blue as they have always been, and she finds she really just wants to skip this part.

When he opens his mouth again to speak, she heaves a great sigh in an effort to cut him off. To her credit, it seems to work, and instead of speaking, he simply stands there watching her, gaze as unnerving as every moment they'd shared before, as though he is trying to read her very soul. It's a look he's uncannily good at, but she's just as good at deflecting, and so as she runs a hand through her hair and tsks out a, "Good grief, Clarence," the look expectedly turns puzzled.

She smiles at him, and it's more a quirk of one corner of her lips, but it's warm all the same. "Look, I know you're sorry. And honestly? I forgave you a long time ago. So can we just skip this part? Because I've been dealing with a lot of shit lately, and as great as Ruby and Sam are, I could really use my best friend again."

His whole face lights up- between the pull of his smile and the spark in his eyes- and if they hadn't already been down that road, Meg figures she'd probably feel a flutter in her stomach at the beauty of the expression. Instead, she just feels relief seep through her bones when he says, "Of course, Meg."

She slips her arm through his, and they continue their walk to Meg's apartment, though after another half block they untangle their arms, complaining that it's much too warm and sticky out to be so physically close. They make plans to spend the evening on her couch watching old movies and catching up.

By the time the sky starts lightening to the pale gray of dawn, they're both passed out on her couch, the TV screen bright blue and flashing "unusable signal," and it's the best she's slept for as long as she can remember.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm doing one final part- an epilogue of sorts, because there's one more scene I wanted to do, have been envisioning since I started writing this, and it just didn't fit here. Either way, it will be a little bit before I do that one because I have to take a break from this fic. It delves into a lot of personal feelings and emotions for me, and as such, some days it's harder than others to write this fic. So, I'm going to take a break for a bit to concentrate on some of my other fics before returning to write the true, final part


	5. Family

It's mid-October, a sharp nip in the air, when Meg comes across her father sitting on her doorstep. She stops short when she spots him, a million different thoughts and feelings racing through her, all competing for prevalencey. When she becomes aware that she's shaking, she takes a deep breath, clutches at the knife in her messenger bag, and, steeling herself, continues walking to her door. She realizes as she comes up on him that he's asleep, or, the more likely scenario, passed out. Anger flares in her hotly before she tries to smother it all back down so that she doesn't do something that could potentially land her in jail. She takes another deep, steadying breath before swiftly kicking him in his leg. The man quickly jolts awake, sputtering violently, before looking up at her with glassy, bloodshot eyes. She glares down at him challengingly.

 

"What are you doing here?" she demands, voice cold as she can muster.

 

He looks at her for a moment, completely lost, and utters in wonderment, "Lilith, is that you?"

 

She can't help rolling her eyes. "No, Dad. It's me, Meg."

 

And then his gaze focuses, though his expression remains lost. "Since when do you have blonde hair?" He says it in such an accusatory manner, like she was purposefully trying to trick him.

 

She bites the inside of her cheek, trying to hold all her aggravation in. "It's called hair dye, you drunk fuck. Now tell me, what are you doing here?" She asks the question slowly, as though she's talking to a very stupid child.

 

"You look like you mother like that," he muses, expression changing to awe.

 

Her anger instantly flares, and, feeling that she is thoroughly over this encounter, she wrenches out her key and inserts it in the lock, fully intending to slam the door in his face and just be done with it all.

 

However, as she goes to close the door, suddenly his foot is in the doorjamb, stopping her. Panic wells up in her.

 

“I will call the police!” she threatens.

 

“Meg. Just let me... talk!” He's grunting in effort as he tries to push the door open. He'd already have it done if not for the fact he is wasted.

 

“No! Leave! Now! I'm not joking about the police!” She's shoving back against the door with all of her body weight behind the movement, but it's a losing battle. She still doesn't weigh much, never has. It was always a losing battle.

 

“You'll have to let go of the door to do that! You won't have time!” he reasons, and the way he says it is so matter-of-fact that her bloods run cold in her veins.

 

“I'll scream,” she threatens, voice small as she tries to keep panic from lacing its edges.

 

“Meg, sweetie, just let me in. I won't hurt you. I promise, baby. I just want to talk.”

 

It's the same argument she's always heard, the only difference being that she's not a naive little girl anymore whose drunkard daddy is the lesser of all evils.

 

“How did you even find out where I live?” She's grunting, body slowly giving out on her as she struggles to keep him from getting through the entryway.

 

“Azazel told me.”

 

And she wants to throw up because, sure, her uncle pays for her and her sister's education, he knows where they live, but it's all hush money and he's never bothered them before.

 

“He asked me to check on you,” her father continues, still pushing against the door.

 

She tries not to cry. She hasn't cried because of her father or her mother or her uncle in a long time, hasn't felt the icy grip of fear clutching at her insides since Ruby got out of that house two years ago, but suddenly it's all fighting against her, and she feels like a terribly small little girl again. A little girl whose mommy hits her, whose daddy drinks to anger, and whose uncle whispers sweet nothings in her ear as he touches her.

 

She steps back from the door, her father almost falling through at the lack of resistance. She has no more fight left to give; no one has noticed or tried to stop the encounter this far. It's the same song and dance it's always been, and she doesn't feel like fighting anymore. All she can hope is that this visit is quick.

 

Her father offers her an awkward smile, and she grits her teeth.

 

“Thanks,” he says, like they hadn't just been engaged in a ruthless struggle seconds before.

 

“Whatever,” she mumbles, turning and heading to place her things down.

 

He whistles low. “Nice place you got here. Azazel keeps you girls up nice.”

 

Her heart drops to her stomach in a free fall. She whips around, glaring viciously at the man. “You haven't been to Ruby's, have you?”

 

He looks back at her innocently. “No. Came to see you first.”

 

She sets her jaw, trying desperately not to see red, trying just to be thankful that in this instance her father finally chose to put her first. “You **won't** be seeing her at all.”

 

Her father's brow pulls down in confusion. “Of course I will. She's my baby girl.”

 

And while it's true that Ruby had always been his favorite, that didn't exactly get her very far. Meg wouldn't honestly be surprised if her father had loved Ruby in much the same capacity as their uncle loved Meg, but they'd never talked about it, so she couldn't be sure.

 

“If you go there, I **will** call the police. I'll give them a heads up.” It's surprisingly easy to keep her voice steady when it's her little sister's safety that's in danger.

 

Her father's lips twitch up into an amused smile. “Since when do you girls stand up for each other?”

 

It's an honestly fair question. They'd been so terribly estranged the last time he'd seen them, hating each other because neither of them had saved the other.

 

She bites back a growl. “We're getting our lives together. We're doing good. I won't let you mess that up for her.”

 

He actually has the audacity to laugh at this, a full body laugh that tips his head back with the force of it.

 

“I'm sorry,” he says through more chuckles, wiping at tears in his eyes, “but that's just too much. Don't tell me you girls think you're worth something.”

 

She clenches her fist. “We are.” Her own voice doesn't sound convincing in front of him, though. It sounds hollow, because how can believe she's worth anything with him standing right there, a painful reminder that no one gave a damn. No one except Uncle Azazel, but it was in so many wrong ways that it hardly counted.

 

“Baby,” he says softly, walking close and running a hand down her face, “you shouldn't let people tell you lies like that.” His voice is so sweet, playing at loving, except the words he speaks are anything but.

 

She purses her lips, blinks back her tears, because there was a time in her life that even this little bit of attention from her father would have meant to world to her. She remembers when she would lay on the kitchen floor, battered and bruised from an encounter with her mother, and her father would barely throw a glance her way as he reached for a beer.

 

“No one loves you, sweetie,” he croons, and it's a knife in her heart, twisting slowly, agonizingly slowly. “No one-” Before he can finish the sentence with the _wants you_ she knows is coming, there's a knock on her door. Her head shoots up as she tries to remember if she could possibly be expecting anyone. She comes up blank.

 

When there's no answer, the knocking grows louder. “Meg, you in there?” It's  _ Dean _ . “Cas said he's been trying to call you, but you're not answering. You okay in there?”

 

Her heart is racing. Thank God for Castiel. Thank God for worried friends, for people that can remind her she is cared for and wanted.

 

The knocking grows in urgency. “Meg?”

 

She shakes herself out of her stupor, brushes past her father, and heads to the door. She opens it and feels immensely relieved to see the older Winchester standing there.

 

Dean frowns down at her. “Everything okay?”

 

She chuckles bitterly. “That is a very loaded question right now.”

 

He draws his brow together even more. She opens the door even more and steps to the side, gesturing towards the man standing in the center of her living room.

 

“Dean, meet my father, Luke Masters.”

 

Dean's concerned frown quickly morphs into something else. To the untrained eye, Dean's expression would probably look like something akin to suspicion, but Meg has been around enough angry men in her life to know that look speaks of violent intent. It's a silent threat to the worn down man standing before him.

 

Her father just sends a lazy, charming smirk Dean's way. “It's a pleasure, I'm sure, but I was just leaving.”

 

Her father strolls casually past the both of them and out of the apartment.

 

Before he disappears, Meg calls out after him, “I was serious! Don't you dare fucking go over there!”

 

He turns and smiles at her, the expression almost looking kind. “You can't stop me.”

 

“Bullshit!” she spits. He doesn't even have the good graces to look scared. Instead, he just shrugs casually at her and continues walking down the street.

 

She slams the door, suddenly in a rage. He doesn't take her seriously, but he will.

 

“Dean!” she barks, and he almost jumps at her tone. “Text Sam. Tell him to keep Ruby out of her house today. Fuck, probably tomorrow too.”

 

“You aren't going to tell her?”

 

“I will, just... not right now. I don't want to worry her right now.”

 

Dean's face pulls into a grim line, but he nods in understanding before pulling out his phone. As for Meg, she storms into her room, grabbing her cell on the way. She has an important call to make.

 

She quickly finds the number, and waits impatiently as it rings, rage boiling under her skin. By the fourth ring, someone finally answers.

 

She doesn't even wait for a greeting before she shouts, “What the fuck!?”

 

“I take it he found you then?” Her uncle's voice is smooth and unconcerned.

 

“Yeah, thanks to **you**.”

 

She can almost hear the casual shrug, can see it in her mind. “He wanted to talk to you both.”

 

She's almost growling. “Tell me what fucking good hush money does if you fucking send him to us?”

 

Azazel snorts out a laugh, and it just fuels the fire in her further. “I hardly see what you're going to do. You girls need me to keep paying out. It won't happen if you take action against him.”

 

“We don't fucking need you or your money.”

 

Azazel just laughs. “Of course you don't.” He hangs up. She's never felt so insulted in all her life. They don't take her seriously, neither of them do, and while she supposes they've never had reason to, they're in for a surprise now.

 

She doesn't even realize she's crying until suddenly Dean is there hugging her, and her reaction is immediate. She's screaming at him, hitting him, begging him to let her go. He just strokes her back, not saying a word, until she collapses against him, tears running freely. She isn't sobbing though. She's far too worn out for it.

 

Dean continues rubbing her back as she cries against his shoulder, and he stays even after that. When she calms down enough to sit by herself in the living room, he calls Cas over too. Castiel arrives in a flurry, blue eyes blazing in a rage she's never seen him wear before. Dean is quick to pull him outside, presumably to calm him down, and it gives her time to think.

 

There may be no point in going to the police now. Too much time has passed, and they'd been accepting money for years. Hell, she's not even sure if that's something she wants to go through. She does, however, want to be rid of them, be somewhere they can't find her, can't find Ruby. Azazel is trying to hold money over their heads, but she thinks maybe that's old hat by now. If she thinks hard enough, they probably don't need it, haven't for awhile. They have just been too stuck in their pasts to stop accepting it, to believe that their family doesn't define them. And she's tired of it, quite frankly. They are worth something; she can't believe that they aren't.

 

Ruby is smart, she has basically been paying for all her school through scholarships already anyway. And Meg has been putting back money from her part-time job, and she can get student loans. She doesn't have that much longer left anyway. The only problem then is where do they live? Is it wrong to still use the money they already have? It's a moral dilemma that honestly gives her a headache.

 

Castiel storms back in, seemingly less angry this time. He promptly goes to sit at Meg's side and wraps her in his arms.

 

“You're moving in with me,” he informs her.

 

She doesn't have the energy to argue that, nor any better ideas even if she did. Instead, she asks, “What about Ruby?”

 

“Sam's been wanting her to move in with us for awhile now, anyway,” Dean supplies from behind the couch.

 

She nods. That works. She slumps against Castiel, exhaustion settling in her bones. She'll need to talk to Ruby, pack her things, talk to her landlord. This list goes on. It won't be easy, but she can't be bothered to think about that right now. Right now, she just wants to sit here and accept the comfort she's being offered.

 

“Thank you,” she murmurs against Cas's shoulder. She doesn't think she can even articulate all the ways in which she means it, that she wouldn't be able to do this without them.

 

She thinks they must both get it, though, because Cas just pulls her closer, placing a kiss to her hair, and Dean places a comforting hand on her shoulder.

 

She remembers thinking that Cas had set out to fix her almost a year ago, but maybe he had just brought to her attention that she had the strength to do it herself all along.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And, it's done. Thank you to those of you who supported this fic in anyway. This is something I started to help cope with some very personal stuff going on in my own life, and it... I think it helped in someway. This has been something very close to my heart, and even though it hasn't gotten a lot of attention, I can't care because it served a purpose to me. It is finally over though, other than maybe some time stamps along the way. I've already gotten a request for one from pharocomics, but it will be awhile before I write it. I need to hand this one up for a little while, because as important to me as it is, the end of it signifies taking some time in my own life to some moving on for myself.


End file.
